


End Times

by sunaddicted



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Coping, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Future Fic, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Kindness, M/M, POV Oswald Cobblepot, Relationship Study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-24
Updated: 2019-08-24
Packaged: 2020-10-01 19:15:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20376685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunaddicted/pseuds/sunaddicted
Summary: There was no use in crying over spilled milk - over spilledblood.





	End Times

**Author's Note:**

> It's sad, I know.

_End Times_

"Not tonight"

"I come in peace"

Oswald snorted - the sound got stuck in his throat in a painful hiccup dangerously close to a sob " _ That  _ would be new" at his age, there weren't many things he hadn't seen or experienced: Batman landing on the patio of his mansion without bad intentions as his motive definitely was unprecedented. 

"It would, yes"

"You're awkward, aren't you? When it comes to normal human interactions" it would explain a lot, really - first of all why a seemingly fit, rich and probably handsome man had taken up the hobby of hunting down criminals while dressed as a goddamned bat. 

Or maybe that was just Gotham. 

Batman shrugged, the cape rustled in the dead of night "I came to offer my condolences" one might wonder why he would do such a thing, especially after the decades he had spent chipping at the Penguin's criminal empire and all the times he had personally dragged him to Arkham - Bruce wondered about that too: it had just felt right to do so once he had heard of the news that the Riddler had died. 

A slip of the foot. 

A bad landing. 

It could have happened to him too - any day now, according to Dick who was increasingly worried about him getting too old and too careless for the job. Maybe he was but it wasn't something he wanted to think about: it would only force him to admit that he never wanted to stop - that he was going to push as hard as he could until he couldn't anymore. 

Just like Riddler. 

Bruce pushed the thought away, almost afraid that the other man would be able to read it in the tense line of his jaw; Penguin had always been worryingly perceptive, he remembered observing the man play the city at his preferred tune and even when someone changed it, 

"Thank you" Oswald had attended plenty of funerals in his life - family, friends, enemies… people in Gotham had the tendency of dying like flies and in spite of that, he had never quite learnt how to accept someone's condolences, he couldn't help feeling revolted by the emptiness in the words - the faint echo of comfort "You could have come to the party" as he said those words, Oswald was surprised to find that he meant them. 

"I'm nocturnal but I've heard it was a blast"

"Nobody walked away sober enough to cause you any problems tonight" 

Bruce wasn't sure that he trusted a bunch of drunk Rogues more than when they were sober but he didn't say anything: bashing the way Oswald had seen fit mourning Nygma didn't really sound like the best of ideas "I brought you something"

"I don't see any flowers"

"I'm sure you've got plenty"

He had - in the unseasonal bout of heat, they had already started to droop and wilt away in the ballroom: the air tasted sickly sweet, as if too much perfume had been sprayed around. Standing amidst them, Oswald felt like he had been entombed alive; the sensation was both panic inducing and comforting, it took him by the throat and squeezed until his mind went numb enough for him to shed the tears that he fought so hard to keep trapped behind his eyelids. 

There was no use in crying over spilled milk - over spilled  _ blood.  _

Oswald tilted his head to the side and watched with some amusement as the caped crusader slid off of his shoulders some kind of thin backpack that had been perfectly hidden by his cape - it was an amusing image, for some reason: it reminded him of a kid shrugging off their rucksack after a long day of school, eager to lose those flimsy responsibilities that always seemed so heavy to children's shoulders. 

Or maybe he had gone mad with the grief he kept bottled inside his body, bubbling away amidst the empty spaces of his ribcage - its fumes poisoned his blood, his heart, his lungs. 

"I think this belongs to you"

No. 

No, it didn't. 

And, at the same time - in some way - it also did. 

Oswald reached out tentatively, afraid that the offering would be yanked out of reach as soon as his fingertips touched the smooth glass "I haven't seen this in a very long while"

Bruce's insides squirmed at those words - ashamed "It was on him one of those times.." there was absolutely no need to specify what he meant with those words: the only instances he had ever been so hands on with the Riddler to the point of finding anything on his person, it was when he had apprehended the other man from the streets "I kept it" Batman shrugged in an attempt at hiding his embarrassment. 

"Trophy?"

"What else?" 

"Do you show them to your conquests?" Oswald teased a little but there wasn't much bite in it, his eyes were focused on the figurine he was carefully cradling in his hands: an old and faded origami penguin, encased in crystal clear glass adorned with flecks of gold "First anniversary present - he was gutted when he lost it"

"I'm sorry"

Oswald shrugged "I gave him a crystal one for the following anniversary" a sad smile twisted his lips as he remembered the genuine delight with which Edward accepted penguin figurines one year after the other; he had liked to collect them, delighting in the variety of design - at some point, Oswald only gifted him custom made ones. 

"That looks very old, though" 

"Sentimental, you mean?" 

Batman shrugged: why go to the lengths of keep an old paper origami preserved in glass if it hadn't had a more loaded meaning hidden in its precise folds? "Yes"

"It's the first one he ever made me"

_ Penguins eat fish.  _

"How long ago was that?"

"Decades" 

Bruce had to marvel at the fact that it had never been destroyed - not even during No Man's Land; Penguin had clearly religiously cared for it and kept it close, where he could reassure himself of its continued integrity despite the violent ups and downs his relationship with Nygma had gone through. 

A love like that - he had never thought they would last, really, but he had been wrong. He wished he had been  _ right _ : it was… difficult to see the pain on the other's face. 

"Thank you for bringing it back" 

"It's yours" 

"It's Edward's"

_ It's yours now  _ \- he wasn't cruel enough to say the words out aloud but he didn't need to: they resonated in the silence between them. Batman briefly fidgeted with the backpack and then he handed it over to the older man "There's some other things.. old heist plans, the original copy of his Arkham's file, surveillance pictures…" small, inconsequential things - fragments of a life that was no more "I'll leave you be"

"No" Suddenly, loneliness seemed like a much more crushing weight "No, please. Have a drink with me"

"I'm on duty"

"You're a vigilante, nobody is supervising you"

Bruce inclined his head to the side, conceding the point "Just the one"

"As you wish"

Anything to avoid going to sleep for a little longer. 

  



End file.
